GOLD: Adobe InDesign CS5.5 $699, direct; upgrades from $119 %displayPrice% at %seller% The industry-leading layout software gets drastic improvements in object placement, anchored objects, varied page sizes, and lots of new support for digital publishing using EPUB and HTML. It's also become an integral member of Adobe's Creative Suite. We were particularly impressed with the auto-column balancing, drag-and-drop anchored objects, and variable page size capability. The $699 program has transformed itself from a grudgingly must-use desktop publishing program into a must-have joy, and new subscription pricing puts it in the hands of more users.—Michael Muchmore

SILVER: Corel Painter 12$429; $229 to upgrade; educational licenses from $99%displayPrice% at %seller% If you really want to turn your PC into a visual artist's tool, you can do no better than Corel Painter, with its unmatched ability to mimic real-world painting and drawing. This version adds watercolor, wet oil, mirror painting, and an impressive, unique, kaleidoscope tool.—MM

Photography

GOLD: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3.5 $299 direct%displayPrice% at %seller% Adobe's workflow app is indispensible to anyone serious about digital photography. It lets you easily organize even the largest of photo collections, and has the unmatched ability to correct for specific lens model's chromatic aberration, vignetting, and geometric distortion. Adobe quickly adds support for each important new camera and lens that comes on the market. The built-in noise reduction obviates the need for a third-party plug-in, though those are supported by the software, too. Lightroom's elegant interface is available to both Windows and Mac users, and on either platform you'll be impressed with the quick, 64-bit operation.—MM

SILVER: Adobe Photoshop Elements 10$99.99 direct, $79.99 upgrade%displayPrice% at %seller% For those who tremble at the "real" Photoshop's complexity and $700 price tag but still want to bling up photos with eye-popping effects, Elements is the way to go. For a seventh of the price, it guides you through some of its big brother's cooler effects. New for version 10 are adjustment brushes and more Facebook integration.—MM

Operating System

GOLD: Apple OS X Lion 10.7.2 $29.99 direct The most elegant, reliable desktop operating system, now with iCloud online syncing! Apple's new operating system takes a page from the company's wildly popular tablet, the iPad, with its own App Store and Launchpad program starter. Other notable new capabilities include full-screen apps, versioning, autosave, better Multi-Touch support, and the impressive AirDrop file transfer. And if that's not enough, the new iCloud service syncs your mail, contacts, calendars, bookmarks, photos, and iWork documents. It also includes "Find My Mac"—most useful for MacBooks inadvertently left in cafes.—MM

SILVER: Ubuntu 11.04 (Natty Narwhal)Free Some Ubuntu purists will hate the direction Canonical took with the latest OS releases, featuring more Windows 7 and Mac-like interface features and the Unity online syncing service. But the resulting increased usability is poised to win new converts to the open-source, number-three desktop operating system.—MM

Social Network

GOLD: LinkedIn Free LinkedIn is positively invaluable for any career-minded person over the age of 20. The site, which launched in 2003, is the place where professionals stay connected. It's free to join, although some functions require a paid account. While some think of LinkedIn as a resource for the job hunt—and to that end, it does have a huge repository of job postings—it's really more like a hub of information about the lifelong connections you make with other professionals. LinkedIn gives you updated information on all those people with whom you might have otherwise lost touch. In a few seconds, you can find out where a former boss is working now, or track down updated contact information for your first mentor and explore his or her network. When you need a quick introduction to a new business partner, whether it's a specific person or anyone at a specific company, you can always turn to LinkedIn to see exactly which of your contacts can help you make the connection. It's also an indispensible way for other people, such as conference organizers looking for a speaker or potential customers/clients, to find you.—Jill Duffy

Utility

GOLD: Evernote for Windows, Premium (4.2.2) Free or $45 per year for premium Evernote's motto is "Remember everything." The company likes to think of its namesake product as "your second brain." Ask anyone who uses Evernote to describe it to you, and you'll likely hear a very personal account of what one person does with the service, from clipping apartment listings, to taking pictures of whiteboards after a meeting, to making notes about wine tasting. Evernote is so open and flexible, each user tends to leverage it in very different ways. That's part of what we love about it. In a nutshell, Evernote has a suite of applications—for iPhone, iPad, Android, Mac, Windows, BlackBerry, and on and on—for taking notes. You can type, record a voice memo, take a picture, or clip a Web page and save it to your free Evernote account. Evernote synchronizes your files and makes them searchable in an incredible number of ways, so that no matter what device you're using, you can always find what you're looking for, or "remember everything."—JD

SILVER: SlimWare Utilities SlimCleanerFree SlimCleaner uses aggregated data from its user base to recommend the optimal settings for your Windows PC. Free, effective, and innovative, SlimCleaner is excellent for those who don't want to pony up money for a tune-up utility or deal with licenses.—JD

Video Editing

GOLD: Apple Final Cut Pro X 10.0.1 $299.99 direct Yes, it's controversial among the video pros, but Final Cut Pro X is a massively awesome piece of software development. Version X brings a new level of ease to complex video editing tasks. Not only has it been completely revamped for 64-bit and multicore support, but its "trackless" Magnetic Timeline video editing metaphor, color correction, "Auditions," "Compound Clips," and content auto analysis will blow you away with their intuitive power. If that's not enough, the new code base speeds up performance enormously, as does the new background processing while you edit. The vast majority of our readers, who are recreational video editors, and even some pros who actually give it a chance, will love it. Apple has vowed to give pros what they need in updates, too, with a few of these already having showed up in the .0.1 release. Oh, and it also dropped $700 in price from $1000 to $300.—MM

SILVER: Windows Live Movie Maker 2011Free Microsoft's entry-level video editing has gotten much slicker in usability and power since its early days, to the point where it's a viable competitor for its Apple equivalent (iMovie). Easily import multiple video formats, jazz them up with transitions, background music, and titles, and directly share them to YouTube and Facebook. And it's free!—MM

Web Browser

GOLD: Google Chrome 14 Free The search giant continues to raise the bar in the Web browsing software game. Speed has long been its main hallmark, and now the Chrome browser can often load a page even before you're done typing its address in the "Omnibar" (which handles search as well). The browser's minimal interface doesn't take the spotlight away from the Web page you're viewing, with but a single control button. Chrome saves users the trouble of downloading and installing Adobe Flash or Acrobat Reader, including those inside the browser. It's also arguably the furthest along in HTML5 support among its browser brethren. And it's no slouch at security, running in a sandbox (and running Flash in its own, too) so that malware code can't infect the rest of your system.—MM

SILVER: Firefox 8Free The folks at Mozilla have taken several pages out of Google's Chrome playbook, delivering faster speed and HTML5 support. Firefox's trim new design, excellent syncing with other Firefox installations (including those on Android), and innovative tab group handling all make for a delightful browsing experience.—MM

Web App

GOLD: Windows Live Hotmail 2011 Free This isn't your grandpa's Hotmail. The folks at Microsoft have taken updating their world-market-share-leading webmail service seriously, adding unrivaled tools for organizing and cleaning out inboxes and viewing active content. Sure, Gmail gets all the praise, but frankly, the emperor has no clothes on that one. The newest Hotmail outdoes Gmail by offering mail preview, a better conversation view implementation, better tools for tidying up that inbox and removing "graymail," or mail that's not spam but not a priority. The new Hotmail is fast (ten times faster, according to Microsoft) and integrates with online storage for photos and Office documents. It lets you view videos, photos, and docs right in the inbox. If you've moved to Gmail because your friends have told you it's the cool new choice, take another look at the current version of Hotmail. You'll be surprised.—MM

SILVER: Google Docs (Summer 2011)Free The best Web-based productivity suite keeps getting more and more the feel of an installed app. It's also the best way to collaborate on a document, and supports standard Microsoft Office file types.—MM

Web App (Blogging/Web Site)

GOLD: Blogger (2011) Free If you're serious about starting a blog but don't know much about hosting a website or coding HTML, Google's Blogger is the best free tool you'll find. The platform has been significantly redesigned and improved in 2011 after years of being fairly stagnant, although the refreshed site is an opt-in change that has kept old-school Blogger fans happy, as well. Team Blogger has finally tucked a rich text editor into the system—a long overdue change—and developed an amazing template designer that lets blog users customize the look of their sites without ever touching a line of code.—JD

SILVER: WebsFree Why install software to build a website when you can do it on the web? That's the idea behind Webs.com, a wonderful and easy-to-use service that helps you build a surprisingly customized content- and gadget-rich site.—JD

About the Author

Dan Costa is the Editor-in-Chief of PCMag.com and the Senior Vice President of Content for Ziff-Davis. He oversees the editorial operations for PCMag.com, Geek.com, ExtremeTech.com as well as PCMag's network of blogs, including AppScout and SecurityWatch. Dan makes frequent appearances on local, national, and international news programs, including ... See Full Bio

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